Passage of Colombia, Panama, and South Korea Trade Agreements

Following congressional approval of the U.S.-Korea, U.S.-Colombia, and U.S.-Panama trade agreements, Secretary Clinton released a statement:

"The Free Trade Agreements passed by Congress tonight will make it easier for American companies to sell their products to South Korea, Colombia and Panama, which will create jobs here at home. The Obama Administration is constantly working to deepen our economic engagement throughout the world and these agreements are an example of that commitment.

"The stakes are not just economic. South Korea, Colombia and Panama are three important partners in strategically vital regions. With the passage of these agreements, America has delivered for our friends and allies. I want to thank Presidents Lee, Santos and Martinelli for their patience and willingness to partner with the Obama Administration as these agreements moved through Congress.

"But our work is not yet done. We will not be content until these agreements are fully implemented so that American exporters can reap the benefits as soon as possible."

"This President has gotten trade policy right. These agreements, made better at the President's insistence, will strengthen and expand ties with strategic partners in Asia and Latin America even as they support tens of thousands of jobs here at home, from shop floors to farms to service firms across our country. TAA reforms will ensure that workers get retraining and assistance for the 21st-century jobs they want and need. And the simultaneous passage of key preference programs upholds our commitment to partner with the world's poorest countries for economic growth.

"Taken together, these initiatives are the leading edge of a job-creating trade agenda that will open markets, level the playing field for our businesses and workers, and champion America's working families in an age of tough global competition. They deserve the historic and widespread support they received in Congress tonight. We will continue our work to rebuild an American consensus on trade."

For more information about the trade agreements, how they will protect workers, and contribute to our economic growth and recovery, please visit the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative's website at www.ustr.gov/FTA.

Comments

Comments

filled59

October 14, 2011

W.W. writes:

It s great but it has to be a sort of shenghen otherwise it will be the usual fraude.

avoid mexico and haiti mistake please

I know ''some people'' will make less money but we ll stay at least ethically correct

Eric

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New Mexico, USA

October 14, 2011

Eric in New Mexico writes:

I was just thinkin'...(a fairly dangerous thing to do on the best of days)...that over the years all these free trade agreements have been discussed and debated and now finally enacted...that no one has explained how long it will take for these things to manifest jobs and economic opportunity in real-time...one year...five maybe?

Be nice to know what the American worker can expect by way of returns, and when we can see results.

Thanks,

EJ

John

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Canada

October 14, 2011

John in Canada writes:

@ Eric in New Mexico

Free trade is novel- however to answer your question would take psychic abilities that no economist has despite what math they apply - funny thing about economic math these days is that we can plug in any figure to determine any result we hope to see - in real life it is usually a different story - math is finite, life in a broad sense is not. No wonder economic decisions seem to lead us down the garden path -who would have thought (laugh)

I think Einstein said it best "not all things that count can be counted and all things that can be counted, count".

The truth, who can say when or ever jobs will materialize - let me explain - first the populations of the countries doing trade need money; coincidentally also jobs to get that money - business needs money to create jobs. Other considerations are, do the people of the trading countries have similar habits for spending, wanting or needing.

If you have a trade deal with a country whose population has little disposable income or desire to spend on what you're selling -what point is trading, your country can sell very little. But there's also the opportunity for more foreign made cheap goods (not sure America needs any more of that).

Trade in goods and services are a second level economy so to speak - all such trade is dependent on the money systems. Without the money systems functioning and they don’t IMHO. Trade deals mean little.

Unfortunately folks seem not to want to understand the "money system" or alternatively have any sense to change the money systems to something that works (not communism).

Think on this - We create money then create interest on top of the money (the fed or central bank). Put it this way. if you needed flour to bake bread and I was the ONLY place that had flour but I demanded in return more flour than you took -How do you pay me knowing that you can only come back to me and become further in debt for more and more flour (heck sounds like the model for the drug trade)?(remember what I said earlier about trade needing money in various capacities- if we need money and that money creates debt that can only be paid by going further into debt - should anyone be surprised about the debt mountains every country is facing right now - what's crazy is thinking under this structure you can do anything about debt -about the only thing you can do is trade your debt - any takers for trillions -laugh)) This is the function; running all money systems today- we can trade with other money systems and pay down the debt but we end up leaving the nation we traded with, greater amounts of debt.(the heart of trade imbalance)

Now if this was not bad enough we now run what is called fractional banking systems - A bank only is required to have a very, very small amount of actual cash compared to their assets and debt they carry. If a bank lends you 1000.00 they literally only have put up 100 dollars(less really) cash for it; not 1000. Crazy - I agree. This is essentially printing money a second time around, only there is no physical representation of cash at all only pretend zeros.

If you deposited 1 million per day into a bank for one month, the bank would use that money to leverage huge amounts of debt (but are these now assets - laugh) - essentially spending your savings - if that huge leverage fails the bank fails and you get whatever your government guarantees - 100 grand maybe. From a very real perspective the money, people think they have, they don’t - it does not exist at all - you can buy property and businesses and they can be valued at whatever but at the end of the day - how much is something worth? What someone is willing to pay or can pay (both of which these days are volatile everywhere). This impacts all levels of trade.

Failure to understand this will make most recovery efforts futile with little effect. Our trading is built on a house of cards- free trade deals may do nothing, they may help for a time but ALL of it is underpinned by our money systems and they are not fit for purpose unless failure is the purpose.

You can take that to the bank Sir- but don’t expect too much when you cash it in (laugh)

Free trade deals are a little like putting the cart before the horse- mileage may vary.

The short answer- flip a coin and ask your questions. I guarantee you will be only wrong half the time.(laugh)

Zharkov

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United States

October 15, 2011

Zharkov in the U.S.A. writes:

We now are seeing the results of earlier free trade agreements - millions of lost jobs, bankrupt state governments, eroding tax base, inferior foreign products, theft of trade secrets, the list is long. If only America had listened to Ross Perot. He tried to warn us.

How did this disaster happen?

In advertising, it's called "bait and switch".

Long ago, CFR and Trilaterals decided to redistribute our industrial capacity to poorer nations. They knew that argument would only appeal to the public if shrouded in plausible logic. Most government officials bought into the idea as well. They argued that consumers benefit from lower prices if we trade with nations which produced goods at lower cost. That argument ignored the obvious fact that consumers must also be producers in order to consume.

So they lied about it, and how Americans would prosper in a new, "service" economy. The lies are only too obvious today, yet those people propose more of the same - more agreements, more factories lost, more economic disaster for our country.

How do they get away with this charade?
Focus on terrorism, Iran, muslims, anything and everything that can distract the public from their financial misery.

We get photo ops and speeches about stimulus packages that feed more money into producing nations rather than our own. Scams upon scams.

America is being looted and pillaged by its own elected officials and their corporate campaign donors. They are doing it to us and our Congress has enabled them.

And their useful idiots have the nerve to blame all of this on Capitalism!

Eric

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New Mexico, USA

October 15, 2011

Eric in New Mexico writes:

@ John in Canada,

I suppose my question must have sounded a bit like asking the weather guy for an accurate forcast, when it's pretty obvious that we are approaching our long cold winter of discontent, and Wall st. could give a damn what the public thinks.

The other day I found my check. accnt. balance in the neg. (an impossible thing)...due to the fact that Wells Fargo decided to end "free checking" ....I told the fellow who manages the branch that I was not informed properly as some "fine print" notice in my statement recieved isn't comparable to a sign in his lobby that says " Welcome to the bank of inconvieniance, we have no free checking starting today."

And that I should probably simply file a police report and have folks charged with "petty theft" for the 8 bucks or so they just ripped me off for, just like a bloody pickpocket would, only they can do it via data entry and corporate policy.

All I want to know is when folks say "thousands of jobs are going to be created" here in America via free trade agreements, when are we going to be seeing the improvement in our economy and stop getting nickled and dimed to death by currancy manipulators and other ethical infants?

I mean someone's got to have an idea, otherwise these things wouldn't have passed in Congress right?

Unless we have the blind leading the blind into fantasies of prosperity and folks are just saying this to make the public feel good about bein' taken for one hell of a ride on our time and our dime, like a never ending roller coaster.

Because I'm too busy pulling myserlf up by the bootstraps to convert my 4x4 into a "technical" with a brick-chuckin' yard-a-pult mounted top-turret swivel action rapid -firing WMD (Weapon of Mental Determination), I can send this message through the sound-proof glass of corporate America with,...late at night so's not to compound the collateral damage,...as folks need a little fresh air in the workspace anyway, I just don't want to hit anyone with a brick and cause a CEO to become more brain-dead than what is already self-evident.

It's what I'd call a main-stream non-lethal "drive by" in the hood in karmic collection action, after all domestic remedies have been exhausted.

Oh heck, why be famous when I can be infamous on the 6 o'clock news?

Know where I can get a really big industrial strenth rubber band, just in case I do find the time?

(chuckle)

EJ

palgye

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South Korea

October 16, 2011

Palgye in South Korea writes:

-If the FTA further divided the Korean people, however, the U.S. would be blamed.

and
SamSung COO go to USA
for negotiation?

Eric

|

New Mexico, USA

October 19, 2011

Eric in New Mexico writes:

@ Palgye,

And here I thought all this time 'lil Kim so ill was the reason the Korean People were divided, FTA or no.